T-Mobile is on the offensive today, hoping to get word out about their own disappointment on today’s fourth place JD Power wireless customer care awards. While we’ve already got two internal statements covered inside our earlier post, this is the official media statement being circled around courtesy of T-Mobile’s PR team. I appreciate T-Mobile’s recognition of their own disappointment and I truly believe they can bring the level of service we expect back this year. They have the tools and now they have the motivation to do exactly that. It’s a challenge, but hopefully one they will not only succeed at it, but also raise above their own previous success to new-found levels of customer service greatness. I know that’s exactly what the front-line team and customers want.

T-Mobile Addresses Latest J.D. Power Customer Care Results

Delivering outstanding customer service is core to T-Mobile, and we’ve been consistently recognized as a leader in Customer Care. This makes our fourth place ranking in the J.D. Power and Associates 2012 Wireless Customer Care Study difficult and disappointing.

T-Mobile incorporated several changes in a short period of time at the beginning of this reporting period. We introduced many new offers combined with changes to our policies and procedures, which made it difficult for our frontline to deliver the highest level of service to customers. Realizing the impact, T-Mobile reacted quickly and made significant adjustments to improve service. For example, changes made to our Speech Interactive Voice Response (SIVR) system have been well received. We’re also making strides to more efficiently resolve customer issues.

T-Mobile is committed to re-establishing our outstanding service reputation, giving our customers the great service they expect and deserve.

About David Beren

David is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of TmoNews.com. He considers himself a Jedi Knight, capable of leaping tall buildings in a single bound and a connoisseur of fine cell phones. He has been involved in the wireless industry since 2003 and has been known to swap out phones far too many times in any given year. Should you wish to contact him, you can do so: david@tmonews.com.

These aren’t exactly excuses. The letter is for employees, not customers.

stoneyjonez

Never mind, you are correct.

Wow

I would say tmobile has the least coverage not customer care

Anonymous

Yeah, they incorporated some changes some of us hate. One of their “changes” that really got to me was the changing of our billing dates without any notice.

Cashman

Yawn……..actions speak louder than words. Get back to the old T-Mobile where customers were treated with respect, not just a source of income

Wow

Tmobile is 4 place in everything no coverage no customers and no cutomer care

Littlesis1774

They are also in fourth place for high end phones as well. No Nexus note, HTC Titan, iphone. They are going be fourth place for awhile unless they do something

Ilyas_k15

Whoa when did that happen?

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_DNR3MMYBLZEKZ6TB6TBPVECNZU JamesM

” For example, changes made to our Speech Interactive Voice Response (SIVR) system have been well received.” I want to talk to a person…not a SIVR system, get a damn clue!!

Damien

I still get a couple of calls per day griping about the SIVR.

Trjcasper

I want to talk to an American person from the point the phone is answered. If the machine must answer a simple “customer service” request should immediately put me in the cue to speak to a person.

aris

Well don’t switch to Prepaid then cuz you won’t get an American person. They won’t even tell you what country they’re in (probably Phliipines or Thailand)…They barely speak English; they’re in a loud boiler room; and they have no clue about Tmobile policies and rate plans. I wonder if they’re just answering calls for several different companies.

Jaygqitalia

Agreed. All I had to say a year ago was ” Customer care “, then ” Customer service ” and I was talking to someone about my needs. If I say billing, give me the billing department. If I say Tech support, give me tech support. Dont tell me to visit the website, dont waste so much time. Im shocked they think it was well received

http://pernecky.blogspot.com Mike

Their customer service was absolutely horrid just after the AT&T announcement was made, but I’ve noticed substantial improvements very recently. I have no doubt they’ll climb back up to where they used to be.

Concerned

The changes made to the SIVR were made back in late summer of 2011. They *had* to be made to correct some (surprisingly bad) changes made two weeks or so prior to that. It was only in response to overwhelming customer complaints about the new system that they corrected it. I heard recently that “Jill” can no longer hang up on our customers, but that is in no way a “giant stride” toward regaining our service ranking. T-mo lost billions in value and bled customers like a stuck pig last year. We cannot afford to pretend that the course of our company needs minor corrections.

Jj15951

What does waiting on hold for an hour to speak to someone have to do with introducing many new offers and changing policies and procedures??? This press release is pure BS and I hope, for TMo’s sake, they dont actually believe it.

Littlesis1774

I hate that. I hate when they transfer you to someone that you can’t even understand

KDJ

Im surprised it took you that long cuz a rep told me last night that she had to hang up on me because we had been on the line for five minutes and she proceeded to disconnect me in mid-sentence. They have a TForce social media team which is a good idea but is poorly implemented by people who have very little power to do anything. If you speak to a few reps, you quickly learned the few phrases that they’re trained to say, and it becomes very annoying

David Icke

Then that was an issue with the representative and is not the way things are supposed to be. The 5 minute limit is if you place a CSR on hold for something call related and dont come back for 5 minutes. You get read a specific script and the call is disconnected. If you respond at any point during that the call continues.

I apologize you have such a negative outlook due to one reps actions, however to base an entire company on a few bad reps and bad experiences on the web is ignorant.

Remember, it’s much easier to be angry and vent about it, then to be content and happy and spread the word.

Anonymous

“I apologize you have such a negative outlook due to one reps actions,
however to base an entire company on a few bad reps and bad experiences
on the web is ignorant.”

What else would you base an opinion of the company on,other that your experience with them?

http://cosmicbreeze.tumblr.com/ DtheArtist

Maybe I’m the only one that never experienced their bad customer service since last year. Maybe it’s because I’m a loyal customer? idk… I was treated the same as always.

Anonymous

what does being a loyal customer have to do with not receiving bad customer service? I’m a loyal customer and have suffered from TMo’s bad customer service last year.

http://cosmicbreeze.tumblr.com/ DtheArtist

I just made a suggestion, get your panties out of a bunch. What you went through has nothing to do with what I received as a customer. I just shared what my experiences were & insights. I don’t even know why I reply to these comments.

Calista22

maybe you should stop replying? u said maybe cuz ur a loyal customer? there are many loyal customers out there like me that t-mobile dont care about so yea.. the way u said it sounded like if t-mobile treats all there loyal customers good. newsflash they dont.

Anonymous

i’ve been with t-mobile since 1999, and I must say, this last year might be the worst customer service i’ve recieved from t-mobile. I do believe them when they say they will rebound in that area.

Anonymous

Same scenario

TMoFan

I thought the same too since the my cs has always been good, but after seeing some old-timers posting here that doesn’t seem to be the case.

G18industries

I have noticed a drop in care.

123

in customers or cs? because honestly, I, customer, really could care less and am apathetic about tmo and their lackluster cs.

Anonymous

No surprise here. Service is terrible, HOLD times an hour or more, G2X failure, poor customer service and lack of coverage in NW Indiana.

Anonymous

The G2X is LG’s problem. LG is crap

Anonymous

Who sold it to the customer?

Anonymous

Touché, el capitan

http://twitter.com/EdConstantin Eddie

Explaining the value plans to customers is a pain in the ass. The right fit guides make customers feel like they are at the doctors office. T-Mobile keeps changing it’s focus every month.

mlwedell

I HATE their automated system!!! Used to be you could say “customer service” & it would direct you to a person right away, now it asks a bunch of questions before doing so — and the voice recognition SUCKS since it never understands my answers.

Anonymous

I know right? I love when I say representative and it’s like we’ve made some changes to BETTER ASSIST YOU. Ha. That’s funny.

Youngt82

So sad!!!!:( We should just leave write a letter to T-Mobile and write bad comments on their FaceBook and Twitter pages and let them feel the heat. Either fix all of these problems and get with the program or we will jump ship and take they asses to court! Haha

http://twitter.com/TheLongshot2112 Jason Birzer

I’ve actually had no problem with customer care this year. The wife’s phone started having issues so was issued a replacement. When I didn’t like the replacement, got a new phone under loyalty (and a two year commitment of course) for free. Had them comp the data, since she didn’t really want a smart phone, but otherwise didn’t have any options. Also, when I called later about a billing question, I got someone on the phone quickly and we sorted it out.

I might not like other things about my experience (Replacing a MotoZine with a Nokia Nuron? You could have given me an Astound at least…), I didn’t have a problem with the CSRs themselves, who gave me what they could.

http://www.unscripted360.com Deacon

i’ve been lucky. i’ve had the same great TMO service last year as i’ve had before.

21stNow

How are you listed on Google+?

Erod188

I have good things to say about customer service.what tmo need to to do is ditch the affordable phone crap and come out with more quality phones

Michelle

funny how D theartist below me says they always treated him good for being a loyal customer… hmm HUN i also been a loyal customer for 5 years so thats deff not an excuse. Also i think it depends were one lives i live in los angeles california. I called t-mobile customer care and they put me on hold for 45 minutes unacceptable so i just hanged up and no im not those persons that call in everyday in fact i never call it was my first time calling in 5 years. Been to 3 dfferent t-mobile stores 1 in downtown LA, 2nd one in montebello ca and 3rd in west covina ca . All 3 stores were empty i was the only one in the store i walk in the people that work there give me a wtf eo u want look? and turn around and give me there back i felt pretty effin stupid just walking around the store like a dumbazz with them giving me that look, not once did they tell me if i needed help till i walked out. Went to 3 at&t stores in the locations i mentioned above in all 3 stores right at the entrance they greet me at the store with a smile and tell me if i need help they show me around some of there phones and i walk out with a working phone and they were nice enough to transfer my t-mobile numbers to at&t. And tell me to have a good day it felt good being treated good unlike the t-mobile stores were they didnt even care about me only if they knew i was gonna go renew my contract with them oh well they missed out because i went with at&t instead were they treated me good. i couldnt be happier.

Celia

Tmobile Press Department is a Joke. Aside from lack of the iPhone, the terrible customer service is the reason so many people are leaving. Most reps are incompetent at best and rude at worst. Ive had great experiences with store employees, but phone reps and web reps and TForce have been a joke. They don’t even listen; they’re just robots with their pat answers that they’re trained to say.

Well if you were not so ignorant you would know that the iPhone 4s is Hspa+ 14 which is the same as your g2.

Anonymous

Would you please take the time to learn some English.

Tmo Employee

Service at T-mo is crap. I work there. We have no hours, so no employees are on the floor, just one for a line of customers. We can not let customers call the customer service line from stores, so we have to call for them (new rule), so yeah… you will wait an hour to get with a rep to pay a bill, or ask a simple question.
And even though you may not like it, that representitive get’s to take a well-deserved break. So you stand in line longer.

If tmo wants to fix service they first need to give hours to stores, so there are employees to help you. Instead, we have no time for you. We have high quotas and need to get the activations to keep our jobs.

So yes, T-mobile needs to fix a lot, and put money in the right places.
Instead they are mirco manageing hours, reducing the number of associates, and telling us all the ways we are not allowed to help you, while explaining we must somehow hit quota.

Sorry but when you go to a store- that’s just reality.

Rory Lewis

Team Together Team Apart, great job.

Dominique

What team? That Team Together Rah Rah went out the door when they started firing everyone, especially long time reps.

Foxeh

I know just seeing T-Mo rock bottom of this list is a shock for many who know of Magenta’s pedigree, but I would have been in shock if it wasn’t down there. I mean I’ve often asked myself if taking Customer Loyalty’s offer back in Fall 2010 was worth it and even considered eating the ETF once or twice.

If the best they can come up with in response to these results are the changes they made to the SIVR…

Not that it matters, their store reps don’t even know when they have a phone on sale with ePins…

Anonymous

Frontline employees not knowing promotions kills me. They seriously email us twice a day on new promotions for a month and people still dont pay attention.

pinto

never had an issue with customer care until the att deal was proposed. it slowly but surely got bad. the sivr is the worst! all i tell them is representative and that USED to do it. now they insist on helping me with sivr when i want a person. just keep on saying representative and you finally get a person. once i reach the person its not a big deal. its the point until i GET to a person that irritates me.

Steve

Saying “representative” doesn’t get you through at all! I tried that for a whole call. It hung up on me saying that “you must provide a reason to speak to a representative. Good bye.” I called last week and it said, “you must give a reason”. I said, “when will service be restored to my area?” (towers not working due to ice storm). It said, “I don’t understand you.” I said, “when will service be restored to my area?” It said, “you have a billing problem, is that correct?” I said, “No.” It said, “I’m sorry, you must state your problem before you can speak to customer service. Good bye.” and hung up. It was 5 minutes per call to get to the point to get hung up on. On my 3rd call, I said, “I have a problem with my bill” and it put me through to someone who answered my question. Ridiculous. A machine should NEVER hand up on the customer because it doesn’t understand the problem.

Anonymous

Same issue a few times its really frustrating.

Guest

As an employee, we complained about the IVR , and it fell on deaf ears for almost a month. People with heavy accents would be hung up on after several failed attempts because they couldn’t speak clearly enough to navigate the system.
The PPU changes were decried before they even hit, since many users have no way of understanding to concept of data usage if they don’t have a plan. Those concerns were met with the rebuttal, “Customers would be notified via SMS of changes and can unsubscribe if they choose to not keep the service, but reps should push the option to upsell to a data plan.” In almost every instance, that alert never happened. In fact, we were told that the charges were valid and no credit would be given. This was eventually overturned because of so many escalated customers/cancellations.
The bill cycle change had a similar response,but we were told to basically lie, that customers were advised in advance of the change. As per internal communication, the only people who actually were notified were people on Easypay, but the verbiage was so off that most customers had no idea what it meant; assuming they actually got the SMS. We basically would have to fall back on the contract terms that TMO had the right to change specific aspects of a customer’s account without notice (try and tell a customer to read the contract terms online). We were able to change the bill cycle to give customers the old due date back because of the backlash.
One thing that I would take away from all of this is that reps in all corporate channels were protesting this just as much as customers, but we did so before the changes were implemented. We were ignored, plain and simple.
The policies and directives were made from the top-down, and every person below had to follow the procedures until the policy was reversed. The changes made recently have been a massive shift away from company core values–where frontline reps have direct interaction with the customer base; feedback was given from the ground-level to change policies/procedures. Needless to say, these changes are also reflective of the CEO change.
As reps, we are all upset about the dive our rankings have taken, but in many instances we are being handcuffed by the new policy changes. There were so many ethical issues that we had to stomach, and I cannot tell you how many conversations that were had over the 180 the company did. Almost all, if not all, of these negative events could have been avoided if management would listen to frontline reps before making these changes.
Sorry in advance for any typos, soapboxing from your phone is a challenge

Juanellobo

Thank you for saing the truth all this is because of att and the stupid lies customer for 8 years and no complain thank you to every body that didn’t support att and is crap. Long live t-mobile juan

Anonymous

Hell I keep getting someone in india almost every time I call. Sounds like dell tech support its very frustrating. When did they star outsourcing customer care?

Tbyrne

For the prepaid service you’re on, quite a while ago.

Anonymous

Yeah it’s only on prepaid and it’s to either Mexico or the Phillipines, not India.

Anonymous

Then they are hiring Indians in Mexico and the Philippines

Anonymous

There are outsourced reps for post paid customer care as well it’s not just prepaid.

Anonymous

I have just used the online customer service within the last year and it was actually fantastic. I asked many questions and received all the info I needed and had 0 problems. I was upgrading to a new phone and wanted to be sure I could keep my current plan with it and they had no issues answering any of my questions. I haven’t had to call though, so I can’t speak about that. Hopefully it will be as nice an experience when dealing with all facets of their customer service going forward. It’s time for them to refocus and get stronger in all areas to attract more customers and keep existing ones like myself.

Jaygqitalia

What does T-mobile changes have to do with these customer service reps just being down right mean lately. That is, when I can actually get through to them

Anonymous

As an RSA, the BIGGEST complaint by far is the SIVR. I hear about it every single day. Something is definitely wrong if our own customers dread calling in because they know they cant reach someone without first going through this whole thing that takes 10 minutes and then sit on hold for another 30….. and the best part is that when you finally get through, they still have no idea why you are calling…. what is the point of all of it?? And the customers know why. They are furious.

Juanellobo

Look people I youst to work with cs and some times the customers sucks because they ate mad or piss tjats not rep problems if you treat cs good they will do same and don’t call ask stupid questions search the net don’t be lasy thank you truth is painfull.

Tbyrne

Swallow your food before you speak!

Silk7412

Its not food he’s swallowing

Jcdc98

It’s not my job as a customer to be nice to a customer service rep is there job to be nice to me the bill I pay every month is what pays there bills. They need to check the attitude at the door shut up abdanswer my questions and fix my issue that’s what they get paid for. Fire fighter can’t have a bad day and say I don’t want to put that fire out. And stop hiring people who can’t grasp the English language.

Guest

You yourself don’t even have a mastery of the English language yourself. You can’t compare what a firefighter does to what a care rep or sales person does. It’s not a matter of life or death that you smashed your phone into a million pieces, didn’t want to add insurance in the first place and now are expecting someone to fix or give you a free phone. Since you want to compare apples to oranges: It’s like after you have been drinking, you drive your car into a ditch, go to the dealership, demand they go and pick up your car, and fix it because the sales person never told you that the vehicle wouldn’t float. Common sense and manners go a long way.

Anonymous

Despite all the crap he is not trying to be a CSR to my knowledge anyways so that english language remark is unneeded . The fire fighter to csr is not a comparison on job but a comparison on principle, you have to do your job and to the best of your abilities and if you can not handle it then why are you even doing it? It is not apples to oranges. In relation to your last comparison its not like that, the situation is like a drunk guy driving his car into a ditch and then later contacting insurance to help fix the car because it had gotten damaged and they need to get around and you have been paying monthly for a emergency situation only to find out your insurance won’t cover you because hey its not our fault… It may not have been your fault but it is your job to make it right and thats what we pay you to do! Thats what you are paid to do if you are a CSR nobody wants to hear you complain about how its not your fault, they just want you to fix it. You are paid to give a crap.

Mmmaxhwadroom

Wtf was that even English?

Dpro

first off youst is not a word. The proper wording is “use to” not even “used” would be proper as used is something that is not new.

Second off you can not eat mad. Unless you want an upset stomach. Plus eating mad and pissing is not a very productive thing to do. LOL

Oh and some comma’s and periods in the right place would surely make your sentences intelligible. Oh wait am I a throwing big words at you? Sheesh man you don’t even have proper command of the English language. I am not surprised you used to work in CS, thank god they let you go.

You really do not get it, nor do a lot of the defensive customer service reps here speaking up.
The customer is paying T Mobile for service. That in turn is paying your wages. Your job of course should be a way to sell the customer on T Mobile but at the same time should be making the customer happy they have gone with T Mobile . That is rule number one in sales.

The minute you have made the customer happy they have made the decision to use your company is the minute you will be able to possibly sell them on something extra.

If you make the customer unhappy they will not want to purchase anything and you will drive them away. Now this seems to be lost on current management because all the metrics are doing is driving customers away.

The old adage was the customer is always right. That was considered good customer service. Now all you self entitled 20 something pricks have this idea in your head that the customer owes you or T Mobile something. Excuse me, the customer signs a contract and pays T Mobile for services rendered. If those services are not rendered or rendered rudely the customer has every right to be upset. If you cannot figure that out you have failed basic customer service 101.

Anonymous

You illiterate moron.

Whatever

T-mobile says they wangt to fix things, But this will piss off a lot of customers because it costs money to fix things and T-mobile will need to get that money from customers.

This is really the can’t have your cake and eat it argument.
T-mobile needs to invest money in far too many directions. they must increase staffing of (US) customer service reps, Increase staffing in stores to promote in store customer service, Invest in LTE to stay competitive, and according to about 1 million people.. Invest in iPhone.

To do this, expect a lot of added fees, or expect very little to be done.
Either answer causes more customers to leave.

I am Very Currious what T-mobile will do.

guest

this was preventable and its not the reps

guest

This does NOT surprise me at all! My husband and I have been customers for years now. TMO customer service is horrendous and down right RUDE! The change of the billing dates was bad enough, but forcing PPU is totally unacceptable! I have an open complaint with them now and waiting patiently for an answer. I am so glad this reflects that I am not the only one to experience the new TMO customer service practices!

Scokes7

The automated system sucks!!!! It takes you forever to talk to a customer rep and I hate that…

David D.

I noticed a tapering off of call quality and signal strength throughout the duration of the AT&T merger fiasco. It’s as if T-Mobile was putting preventative maintenance on hold throughout much of 2011.

I never had to sacrifice my sanity to the IVR gods, but I did have to visit a store in December to upgrade my phone’s OS from 2.2 to 2.3. The quality of customer service seemed to be lagging–the store was clearly understaffed and each transaction took a considerable amount of time.

I think a contributing problem is the changes to the calling plans. Things were much simpler when there were just Even More and Even More Plus options. Explaining all the fine print is an unwieldy process and makes T-Mobile that much less of an attractive option for people trying to escape the AT&T and Verizon fine print.

Anonymous

They are really no different, Classic = Even More and Value = Even More Plus (except the 2 year contract)

http://profile.yahoo.com/VBJ5Y5AO47AZSVVVBSFEBI6GVU karma l

stupid phone reps, rude retention reps, outrageous $200 per line plan
change fees to loss of SIGNAL in every building. TMO is going down the
hill to sink

Anonymous

T-mobile… your CS is shitty… get over it. your 5th and rightfully so. You should be 10th or 11th

David Icke

*You’re 5th

http://twitter.com/RudyFlyer4 CJ

Get Rid of the Upgrade fee for customers with 5+ years of service. They can not explain to my why my wifes phone has chicago tax which is 5x more than our city telecom tax when we do not live in the city and they will not get us a new number

Had enough

sounds like tmobile is loosing customers quicker than ever. i feel like tmo usa is now run by a bunch of pot heads that dont know wtf they are doing. 4th place in every competition. when will we get good news? been patiently waiting..

wonder why

They fired all of there reps that were paid well take it from an ex retention Rep of 7 yrs who Was fired for no reason NY center had 800 employees they now have 200 wtf and the ones left are corporate sociopaths.

Sandee

I can tell u I saw this coming I’ve been with T-Mobile since they were VoiceStream and ALWAYS bragged about their customer service…in the last 5 months…they done nothing but screw me over and the managers back them up. I also work in customer service so my expectations were right up there…I even told the manager their cs skills have deteriorated and this 4th place is proof.

mjd.Inc@live.com

TMobile is the worst and I wish they were bought out. When we as consumers have an issues you refuse to take care of us we are sold faulty bugged phones, which you know were faulty and you want to charge me to replace that hell no. Your loyalty department sucks and they all should be fired no wonder you are in last place. I am out.

Anonymous

So no other carrier charges you shipping for defective handsets? Get the hell outta here!!! :)

Seffington

Yep i got fired from them for not changing… Imma not alone there was many of us old timers let go in the past year… I just didnt get on the jerk train!!!

Anonymous

I honestly think they gave up thinking ATT was gonna takeover and fire everyone anyways.

the_truth

It’s a great time to work for Verizon.

Glad I left TMo.

the_truth

It’s a great time to worl for Verizon.

We won’t let JD Powers go anywhere else.

Kirk

Like many loyals here, I have been with T-Mobile for many years. The customer service this past year was just horrible. Reps were rude and down right argumentative and confrontational. Completely unprofessional. I had to hold myself back from telling a rep to “f*ck off.”

I have always praised T-Mobile and over the years I have convinced MANY family and friends to switch to the carrier, it also made sense for free T-Mobile to T-mobile calling, but I would never refer family and friends if they acted the way they do now back then.

Some may have hope but I’m starting to lose hope. I’m waiting until around summer then if things don’t turn around I’m taking my several lines and leaving.

Matthewsj

Want to make me a happy customer? Get me the HTC Titan.

concerned… thats no scripted

just read comments on previous post on jd power.

Were Just talking to a wall.

tmobile needs

one plan a good one, ability to talk to customers as person, no
stopwatch, no mandatory up sell or punishment to actually give what the
customer needs. Please no fake phrases as one would here if they called
india. “I am so sorry about inconvenience this may have caused you.”
People don’t like that actually it causes the opposite of concern” no
matter how you package it. GET REAL

Guest

Sooo true! Couldn’t have been worded it better!

customers are just as bad

Honestly, having personal experience, US consumers (TMobile Customers) need to get over the have your cake and eat it too syndrome. T-Mobile isn’t a charity and your bill isn’t something that becomes free over time. Tmobile is the least expensive of the 4 national carriers, data is a great value, and last but not least, customer care wants to get better! Focus on the positive and pay your bill.

Guest

You are the part of the problem. Reps like you just bitch instead of doing their job. It’s not our fault that management is hard on you so you take it out on the customer. And it’s their bosses that have screwed up the company due to poor decision making. You can’t honestly say get over it when you have had GREAT customer care in the past and now it’s gone! You can’t take away stuff from customers and expect them to take it anymore. People don’t put up with the bs anymore, especially during such crappy times. That’s why they’re angry. It has nothing to do with over entitlement or having your cake and eating it too. Try being less bitter and quit your job in customer relations or get some therapy. I was in the cell business (the head technician but still dealt with customers on occasion) for 5 years and people like you gave us a bad name. You CANNOT take away things people are used to and expect no uproar! Simple as that…

Anonymous

98% of calls to customer care are people complaining about their bill because its not what’s advertised, mind you TAX is not added (state/federal/whatever the govt adds) or complaining about being cut off 3 days after their bills are due….a bill is a bill. Pay up or cancel. Also, the wireless industry has spent YEARS giving handouts from free phones to free first months. PEOPLE STILL expect that. I’ll admit, the company has not been great since March of last year but customers haven’t been great either. There is no respect anymore…and people calling to bitch to try to get something free is pretty much the norm now. I bet you’re one of those customers….

Guest

I get some of that but still… it’s your job to deal with it in a nice, friendly way. Like I said before… I’ve been on both ends! I get it… some customers were pains but you have to hold back and be nice! Simple! It’s your job… if you can’t handle people, bitchy or nice, then consider a different line of work like research or technology where you hardly deal with people. I know as a rep you really have little control over what your company does and it’s frustrating but customers REMEMBER when reps where nicer and loyalty gave phones away for cheaper! That’s why some are angry because they were used to better treatment. I’m not talking about cheap people not paying their bill lol! Why is that so hard to understand?!

Guest

So…finally, a voice if reason. The main reason for TMOs fall to 4th place is those ridiculous customers and their unrealistic demands! Being that Verizon and Sprint both have reasonable customers explains their higher ranking. Sounds logical to me.

Hello183654

Sounds like entitlements!

Guest

No, it’s called getting what you paid for. Many of us could have left tmobile years ago before they added 3G, beefed up their product line, etc but stayed loyal BECAUSE we were treated well and some did for the price. So, naturally, they are used to it. Now, on the onset of REAL 4G, tmobile is behind again on their network, few good phones planned for 2012 due to poor planning and depending on their pathetic AT&T merger… sooo wtf is to keeping people from leaving?! Their pricing isn’t that great anymore nor CC so Sprint/Verizon is looking better and better…

Anonymous

You’re saying it yourself. T-Mobile IMPROVED things from the time you signed your contract. You knew what you were in for during your buyer’s remorse period and as far as anyone’s concerned that’s all you were entitled too. But since that time they, as you say:

” before they added 3G, beefed up their product line, etc but stayed loyal BECAUSE we were treated well and some did for the price. So, naturally, they are used to it. ”

You’re paying the industry’s lowest rates for national carriers and get the best coverage of some of the fastest mobile data speeds. That alone should keep you a satisfied customer.

Personally, I don’t believe customer care has ‘CHANGED’ that much, I think it’s more of a case of them giving away less freebees and credits to customers when the problems they have are clearly their own fault. That’s reasonable. T-Mobile should credit and accommodate customers when T-Mobile is in error. I think before, even if it was the customer’s fault they would take care of things but considering how much marketshare they have been losing DESPITE going above and beyond for customers why should they be losing MONEY by doing that too?

If you were running T-Mobile and your customers were upset with something caused due to their own lack of responsibility and you went out of your way to credit them or get them a free phone or whatever and those customers re payed you by leaving your company anyway in droves wouldn’t you see less of a point to waste money on those efforts as well?

Hate to say it, but consumers did this to themselves. If consumers put their money into T-Mobile and grew the business we would probably still have no contract post paid plans and all those other perks from back in the day. All those things you liked about T-Mobile weren’t helping to grow T-Mobile. Consumers voted with their wallets for the state of the wireless industry now, so enjoy it. If it wasn’t for Government intervention blocking the att merger it would have been even worse for everyone.

I’d like to know where all these people are leaving to where it’s any different.

What’s one policy that people are so worked up about that they hate on T-Mobile that no other carrier does?

Damien

I’m sorry UMA_Fan but customer care is completely different than it was 2 years ago. How do I know this? Because I’m a customer service rep. The reps all talk with each other about the poor service that is provided because of the changes there. I don’t know of a single rep, senior rep, or coach who isn’t testing the waters for another job. The entire culture of tmobile has changed in the area of customer service, so I don’t know where you get “I don’t believe customer care has ‘CHANGED’ that much”.

Guest

Thanks! You actually get it! I hope tmobile regains more reps like you. I’m glad I got out of the cell game though lol! Although, I haven’t had such an interesting job since ;)

Logomancer

“You’re paying the industry’s lowest rates for national carriers and get
the best coverage of some of the fastest mobile data speeds. That alone
should keep you a satisfied customer.”

Poppycock. Coverage in the mid-Atlantic region is a joke. For the majority of my time with T-Mo, I’ve had EDGE in my area while everyone else surrounding got 3G or 4G. Recently, we just got a couple of 4G towers put up, but coverage is so spotty it drops out frequently, causing my phone to spaz out on the bus commute to work. In addition, they have ZERO coverage in West Virginia, so when I go there I get to roam on AT&T and have my smartphone get no data, lest I get hit with a ridiculous data roaming charge.

Little 4G coverage to speak of and no coverage where I go visit have been my constant complaints with T-Mo, since before they pursued the merger.

“Personally, I don’t believe customer care has ‘CHANGED’ that much, I
think it’s more of a case of them giving away less freebees and credits
to customers when the problems they have are clearly their own fault.”

Nonsense. I and others have noticed increased wait times, more foreign call centers (even on postpaid accounts, since I have one and was routed there), and sloppier training. This is more customer-blaming for the cost-cutting measures that are T-Mo’s fault for trying to fatten themselves up before the merger.

“Hate to say it, but consumers did this to themselves. If consumers put
their money into T-Mobile and grew the business we would probably still
have no contract post paid plans and all those other perks from back in
the day.”

Since when is it a customer’s responsibility to grow any business? We’re not your damned marketing team. We put money into T-Mo as paying customers, and got back crappy coverage, more restrictive plans, the loss of being able to bring your own phone and go month-to-month with a slight discount (which is the big reason I talked up T-Mo in the past; now, I’d sooner recommend Sprint), crappier customer service, and (apparently) more hidden fees. This is why people are complaining.

T-Mo was awesome because it wasn’t like other carriers. Now that Humm deep-sixed a lot of that, it’s becoming AT&T with slightly better morals and much worse coverage. No good can come of that.

Guest

No, it’s called getting what you paid for. Many of us could have left tmobile years ago before they added 3G, beefed up their product line, etc but stayed loyal BECAUSE we were treated well and some did for the price. So, naturally, they are used to it. Now, on the onset of REAL 4G, tmobile is behind again on their network, few good phones planned for 2012 due to poor planning and depending on their pathetic AT&T merger… sooo wtf is to keeping people from leaving?! Their pricing isn’t that great anymore nor CC so Sprint/Verizon is looking better and better…

customers are just as bad

My only concern is our customer base and there sense of entitlement. T-Mobile isn’t a free service, and customers who have spent 3 to 5 years with T-Mobile act like they deserve the world, they just assume that the signal falls out of the sky and have zero concept what it actually takes to maintain a network like tmobiles. Since when is a phone upgrade discount not enough? Technology isn’t perfect tmobile certainly isn’t, but it doesn’t give customers (I’m talking about a minority here) the right to treat care reps like they do

About PhoneDog

PhoneDog is one of the largest and most popular interactive mobile news and reviews resource that attracts a community of more than 2.5 million unique visitors each month. The site may have a "cute" name, but it offers up serious editorial content and video reviews that users rely on to make important decisions about their next mobile purchases.